Welcome to Part 3 of our Web Traffic Blueprint article series, where we show you how to create an automated traffic generating machine using the WordPress CMS.
In Part 1 of this article series, we described the process, and explained why using an expertly configured WordPress website or blog is the key to automating traffic to your website …
(With an expertly configured WordPress site, all you have to do to attract more traffic is publish new content consistently!)
In Part Two, we discussed the setup phase of the traffic automation process. We explained the best way to get started if you don’t have a web presence yet, how to set everything up if you already have a site, and what to do if your existing website was built using WordPress.
(In Part two we show you where to set up a WordPress web site on your domain)
In this article, we will discuss the configuration phase of the traffic blueprint. You will learn how to configure a WordPress site so you can ensure that web traffic will automatically start flowing when you publish new content to your website.
WordPress Web Traffic Automation System – Configuration Phase
The ability to attract more visitors to one’s website is often cited by most website owners as one of their greatest challenges online. With competition making business survival progressively tougher businesses are exploring any advantage they believe will help them increase their competitiveness online.
Having the ability to automatically generate traffic on demand can provide website owners with a huge competitive advantage. For businesses, having an expertly configured website means having an immediate advantage from the word “go”.
The Configuration Phase Is What Makes All The Difference
There is a significant difference between an expertly configured WordPress site and a website that has been professionally installed and set up by a website-building expert but not necessarily configured to take advantage of everything WordPress has to offer.
Here’s one way to describe the differences:
With a WordPress site that has been expertly configured you get a professional web presence with online business marketing automation!
(An expertly configured site gives you a web presence with a built-in automated online business marketing system!)
Not only are more steps needed to build and integrate an automated online business marketing process into your website, it also takes a special kind of expert knowledge.
Let’s illustrate this with an amusing little story.
A True Story (Kind Of) …
All is moving along in the gizmo factory when things suddenly cease working.
As no one can figure out what is wrong, the manager decides to call in an expert.
Shortly after arriving, the expert immediately heads to the main control box. After staring at the schematics for less than 3 minutes or so, the expert then produces a teensy-weensy hammer and makes a very gentle tap near the right side of the control unit.
Immediately, everything starts working as before.
The plant manager is greatly overjoyed as he thanks the expert, who then leaves as quickly as he had arrived.
A few days after resolving the incident, the manager receives an invoice for $5,000.
Angry and confused, the manager picks up the phone and calls the expert. Why had he charged them so much for less than 5 minutes work? He then requests an itemized invoice and hangs up.
The next day, an invoice arrives in the manager’s in-tray. Upon opening it, this is what he sees:
The number one challenge most businesses face online is driving visitors to their sites.
How much money did the gizmo factory stand to lose when production stopped working and no one in the business had the expertise to fix it? Did the expert in our story not have every right to get paid fairly for having spent years building up the knowledge and expertise that enabled him to immediately assess and avert a potentially costly crisis?
Similarly, if you could have a WP website set up so all you ever had to do is publish content to it and search engines, social followers from sites like Facebook and LinkedIn and dozens of other traffic-generating online properties would be instantly notified, how much time and money would you save?
(How much time and money would you save if you could automate the process of driving traffic to your website?)
While the solution to many challenges is often ridiculously simple once it’s been implemented, it rarely turns out to be that way.
Expertly configuring a WordPress site requires more than adding some pages with content and configuring a few basic settings. It involves knowing where to tap! This includes knowing things such as:
- Which programs you need to install to add desired functionalities to your site.
- Which third-party services you need to set up and activate to get specific outcomes
- Which options need to be configured to ensure that everything will work as envisioned, etc.
(Generating new traffic automatically with WordPress is a process that requires knowledge and expertise)
Although this part of the WordPress traffic automation system may not seem technically difficult, it can be quite involved and complicated. This is because it’s not as easy as installing a plugin, configuring some options and settings in your admin area … it’s all this and so much more.
The configuration phase is a process that involves your web hosting server, your web site, and a number of external sites and services …
(Expertly configuring your website involves more than just configuring some WordPress settings)
If the steps involved in the configuration process were to be flowcharted, it would look something like this …
(A simplistic flowchart showing the steps involved in the configuration phase)
Let’s examine what’s involved in more detail.
Web Server Configuration
We’re not talking here about the process of configuring your web-hosting account for site installation purposes. We’re talking about fine-tuning settings and options in your server that affect how your site will handle web traffic …
(In the configuration stage, your hosting account settings need to be fine-tuned for handling both good and bad traffic)
Not all web traffic is positive traffic. Some of the web traffic your website may attract will be unwelcome traffic like bot spam, security threats, bot-hacking attempts, etc.
This area of the configuration process, therefore, is all about evaluating your needs, planning for bad and good traffic and then adjusting settings in your server accordingly. This includes looking at things like implementing spam protection and securing server files, to configuring domain and email redirections, setting up htaccess and error page redirections, etc …
(Have you configured your hosting control panel settings for handling things like email forwarding, page errors, etc?)
After your web server settings have been checked and configured (if required), the next step of the configuration phase is to set up a number of external sites.
External Web Properties & Services – Configuration
The basic idea of setting up external sites is that all content is posted to a central location (your site) and from there, it gets distributed automatically to other components of your web traffic generation system, or notify traffic-related web properties and services.
After incorporating these external platforms into your traffic network, content linked back to your site gets automatically published on these platforms, indexed by search engines and shared to other social networks, even to visitors attracted to the platform itself. Your content will then be given exposure to new audiences and new sources of traffic.
Some of these web properties and online solutions will need to have accounts set up before configuring your site to speed up the process and some will need to be done later, during the automation phase.
For example, here are just some of the accounts you will need to have set up:
Google Search Console
(Google Webmasters)
Google Search Console lets you tell Google about your site’s pages, submit XML sitemaps for automatic page indexing, and provides you with essential data, tools and diagnostic reports about your website.
Once your account and site details are set up, this information can be used to automate traffic-related settings and notifications in WordPress and other applications.
Google Analytics
(Google Analytics)
Google Analytics lets you improve your website’s performance, SEO, marketing campaigns, sales conversions, and more, by tracking all user behavior, pages visited, keywords searched for, organic referrers, etc.
After setting up your up your Google Analytics account and site data has been entered, you can add traffic tracking information to WordPress using any of several Google Analytics plugins and send data automatically to various other useful applications and web properties.
Bing Webmaster Tools
(Bing Data And Tools)
Bing Webmaster Tools is similar to Google Search Console. Once your account has been with Bing are set up, your information can be used with traffic-related settings in WordPress (e.g. using plugins like Yoast SEO) and other applications.
WordPress.com
(WordPress.com)
As explained in Part 2, WordPress offers website owners a self-hosted and a hosted option. We recommended choosing the self-hosted WordPress platform if you plan to build a professional online presence for your business.
WordPress.com (the hosted option), however, provides some great features, which various WordPress plugins can access. We recommend setting up an account at WordPress.com, therefore, and we’ll show you how to integrate these features into your traffic generation system in the next installment of this series.
Social Media And Social Bookmarking Sites
(Syndicate your content automatically to your social media and social bookmarking accounts and drive new traffic to your site)
You will need to set up your social accounts in order to configure these as part of your traffic generation system.
After setting up and configuring everything, you will be able to syndicate your content automatically to your social media and social bookmarking accounts and get new traffic to your site.
Set up accounts and profiles with all of the main social networks – Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Pinterest, LinkedIn, etc.
There are lots of social bookmarking sites you can set up. You don’t need to go crazy, just pick those that will work with your setup and/or content syndication tools (we cover some of these tools in more detail during the Automation phase).
(There are lots of social bookmarking sites you can syndicate your content to. Image: ShareThis.com)
Additional Services, Aggregators, Etc.
There are a number of emerging technology platforms and content aggregators that can serve as second-tier traffic generation sources. Some are free or provide free levels, and some offer a range of pricing plans.
For example, here is a content aggregator site that lets you add a feed from your site …
RebelMouse
(RebelMouse)
RebelMouse is an aggregator for your RSS feeds and social profiles. Your content displays in a Pinterest-like format and visitors can follow your own RebelMouse account.
There are various technologies and third-party applications you can incorporate into your traffic blueprint. Please contact us if you would like to explore your options and discuss a configuration strategy to suit your needs.
After you have configured your server settings and set up third-party service accounts, it’s time to configure your site’s settings.
WordPress Site Configuration
The first step in configuring your WordPress site for traffic is to make sure that your global settings have been set up correctly.
Let’s go over some of the important points.
WordPress Settings
By default, all WordPress installations include a Settings section that allows you to configure your site’s main settings …
(WordPress admin menu – Settings)
General Settings
Content entered into fields like Site Title and Tagline can affect your site’s SEO, search indexing, etc …
(Settings Menu – General Settings)
Writing
The Writing Settings section contains an important and often overlooked automated traffic notification system …
(Settings Menu – Writing Settings)
As described below the Update Services section title,
When you publish a new post, WordPress automatically notifies the following site update services …
Unless you or your webmaster have intentionally chosen to prevent search engines from indexing your site, then your site will automatically ping the list of services entered into the Update Services field
With an ‘out of the box’ WordPress installation, only one service is listed …
(WordPress Update Services)
You can notify dozens of update services automatically with WordPress …
(Notify dozens of update services automatically with WordPress!)
Download A Comprehensive List Of Ping Services For Your WordPress Site!
Click the link below to download a comprehensive list of reliable and authoritative ping services for your WordPress site or blog:
Download A List Of Ping Services For Your WordPress Site
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Note: If you need help setting up the list of ping services on your site, we recommend using a professional web services provider. You can find professional WordPress service providers in our WordPress Services Directory.
Reading
This section affects how visitors will see your content when they visit your home page and blog pages.
The syndication settings in this section can influence traffic. For example, your choice to display the full content vs a summary of your post, affects how your content displays to users in RSS feeds and RSS email campaigns, and could play a part in someone’s choice to explore your content further, and whether or not they will visit your blog to read the rest of the content from summaries, or read the content in full without the need to click through to your site.
The main setting in this section as far as traffic is concerned is whether the Search Engine Visibility check box is ticked or not.
Typically, you want search engines to visit your site. Leaving the box unchecked enables WordPress to automatically ping various update services whenever new posts are published (see Writing Settings above). Unless there is a specific reason why search engines should not visit your site, make sure this box is left unchecked …
(WordPress Settings – Reading Settings)
Discussion
Although this section is mostly concerned with how users engage with content on your site, you have the option to allow notifications to sites linked to from your articles, and to allow link notifications from other blogs (pingbacks and trackbacks). This can work for you, but it can also drive bad traffic in the form of SPAM comments …
(WordPress Settings – Discussion Settings Screen)
Permalink Settings
Your Permalink settings allow you to publish posts with SEO-friendly URLs …
(Settings Menu – Permalink Settings)
Here are some of the options for configuring your site’s search-friendly URLS …
(Configuring post permalinks)
We have created a detailed tutorial about using permalinks in WordPress here: Changing Your WordPress Permalinks
WordPress Traffic Generation Plugins – Configuration
WordPress provides users with plugins that help to add just about every type of functionality to your website, including traffic generation.
Here are examples of plugin categories and plugins that can help drive more visitors to your site
WordPress Security Plugins – Blog Defender
Once again, it’s important to configure your WordPress site for dealing with the effects of both good traffic and bad traffic. No matter what type of business you run or plan to run online and how small you think your web presence is, securing your website is something you cannot ignore.
(Security Plugins help prevent bad traffic from causing your website harm)
Security plugins like Blog Defender help to make your website invisible to botnets and hackers.
For more information, go here:
SEO Plugins – Yoast SEO
WordPress SEO plugins help drive traffic by making your web pages more search engine friendly …
(SEO plugins help drive more traffic by improving your website’s SEO)
A plugin like Yoast SEO can improve your SEO. When properly configured, the Yoast SEO plugin not only makes your site easier for search engines to index, it allows you to configure how your content will show up in Google’s search results and social media sites Twitter, Facebook, and Google+.
Social Sharing Plugins
Allowing visitors to share your content with members of their own online communities can help drive more traffic to your site, especially if your site provides content that adds real value to readers.
(WordPress users can easily add social sharing to their site using free or inexpensive WordPress plugins)
WordPress users can easily add social sharing features to their website using WordPress plugins.
Most social plugins let you select which social sites visitors can share your content to, embed social buttons into your content, set up default update notifications, display/hide share counters (e.g. number of followers), etc. Some social sharing plugins even allow you to protect content or downloads which visitors can unlock by liking your page.
Themes
As well as configuring various plugins, many WordPress themes also include features that help grow your traffic.
For example, in addition to options and settings for configuring the design and layout of your website, some themes also give you built-in features that let you improve search optimization and site navigation structure for faster indexing, add analytics, social sharing buttons, etc …
(Many themes come with built-in traffic optimization features)
With many quality themes, adding social sharing buttons to your content is as easy as clicking a couple of buttons to enable the function …
(Many WordPress themes have built-in social sharing features)
Configuring Other WordPress Features For More Traffic Results
Last but not least in the traffic configuration process, are the components that need to be set up outside of the global settings.
This includes:
Legal Pages
Once again, when preparing your website for a growth in visitor numbers, it’s important to plan not only how to handle good and unwanted traffic but also for all the things that can go wrong when more and more people begin to visit your website.
If you are making money online (or are planning to), you need to make sure that your site stays compliant with all government laws and regulations.
(Is Your Website Legally Compliant?)
We have created a detailed article on adding legal pages to WordPress here:
Post Categories & Tags
WordPress tags and categories help search engines index your pages, which helps to increase traffic.
(WordPress post categories help improve traffic by allowing search engines to better index your pages.)
As we strongly recommend in this article, it’s best to discuss and set up your website’s post tags and categories during the Website Planning Phase.
When considering ways to automate and improve web traffic, you will want to review and make sure that the categories and tags that have been set up.
Site Map
A site map that lists all of your site’s posts and pages is not only a useful navigation tool for users, it can also help external tools discover more of your web content …
(A site map is not just great for visitors, but for traffic too!)
It’s important to note that an HTML site map and an XML sitemap are not the same thing. Only search engine bots can read XML sitemaps. Although search engines like Google will index your pages just using an XML sitemap (which a plugin like Yoast SEO will create for you – see earlier section), making it easier for visitors to find more pages on your site can result in increased traffic.
404 Page – A Source Of Lost Traffic Opportunities!
When online visitors enter the wrong web address into their browser or click on hyperlinks pointing to pages on your site that no longer exist, they will normally be presented with a 404 error page …
(Default WordPress 404 Not Found error page)
A 404 Not Found error page can be configured into a useful source of traffic to your functional web pages …
(Configuring your 404 Error Page allows you to recover web traffic that may otherwise be lost.)
Although a 404 page can be set up in your server, there are WordPress plugins that let you easily configure your 404 page inside your WordPress dashboard.
WordPress Traffic Blueprint: Configuration Phase – Summary
Once your website or blog has been fully set up and expertly configured, all you have to do is add fresh content on a regular basis to attract more web traffic.
The process of expertly configuring your WordPress site, however, is quite involved and elaborate , requiring the configuration and integration of different elements and web properties …
(WP Traffic System – Configuration Phase Checklist)
The expertise involved in expertly configuring a WordPress site can take some website developers months to acquire.
Once you have expertly configured your WordPress site, the next step is to automate the aspects of the process that can be automated. This step is covered in the next article in the WordPress Traffic Automation System series.
This is the end of Part 3
To keep reading, click here:
This article is part of a comprehensive article series aimed at helping you learn how to grow your business online inexpensively and drive traffic sustainably using a WordPress website and proven online marketing methods.
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"This is AMAZING! I had learnt about how to use WordPress previously, but this covers absolutely everything and more!! Incredible value! Thank you!" - Monique, Warrior Forum
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